Why has london had so few cases recently?

[yearinyearout]

What's going on here? The other day only 24 new cases, then 19, then none. I've read the news and it's not making sense to me, unless loads of people have had it and created some kind of herd immunity why is this so low?

[coronabeer23]

I think it has been around in London for much longer. Almost certainly since late January / February. In my office a good few people had a horrendous flu with coughing and shortness of breath being the main symptoms. I think highly likely to be Covid-19 in hindsight. I also had all 3 of my children more ill than any of them have ever been in mid feb, again, I’m keen to know if this was CV as I expect it was.

[endofthelinefinally]

My neighbours had it at the beginning of March. London was hit first and there was no testing or recording then. People who had symptoms and were ill at home for weeks weren't on the radar.

[DisgruntledGuineaPig]

I'm another who knows a lot of people who were sick in London at the end of March. DH was last in the office in London (we live outside M25) week ending 13th March as they wanted more people WFH before the government announcement - and there were 2 or 3 from his team off sick with bad cough and feeling rubbish which might have been Corona but might not and never got so bad they bothered contacting the NHS, they just went home and watch daytime TV while having fluids and paracetamol...

Seems the virus might have blown through.

[longestlurkerever]

Anna, agreed, but the interesting q is why? I find it difficult to believe London has been locking down more effectively than elsewhere, unless things like passing in streets and hanging out in parks are irrelevant really, which is entirely possible. Or is it that community transmission is actually low everywhere and it's hospitals/care homes that vary? I honestly don't know.

[Nihiloxica]

Or is it that community transmission is actually low everywhere and it's hospitals/care homes that vary? I honestly don't know.

Well that's what they have been saying is the case on the daily briefing for weeks.

[Mummyoflittledragon]

Magic2020
Thank you for coming onto the thread. Long may this trend continue!

I was told by the GP to presume what I had was coronavirus a fortnight before lockdown. Dh has been randomly selected to test to see if he actively has covid. I expect the results to be negative.

[ReturnOfTheTriffids]

on our street alone, we got it in March. Our neighbours both sides had it in March. 2 sets of friends who live further down the street had it just before us in March (one works in a salon so has a lot of interaction with people and the other is a decorator who again was out and about on different jobs). We got it just as lockdown started, as did our neighbours but the salon worker/decorator got it in the weeks beforehand.

friends of ours who live a few streets down had been to Italy in half term and they came back with it.

exh and his partner went to Spain in half term and they came back with it. His partner saw a doctor and was diagnosed with it as they were one of the early lot to get it.

in our local food store which is 2 mins walk from the house, where we know all the people that work at the tills, they all had it early March as well

by the time they did the lockdown, the majority of the people we know and associate with either had had it or were in the middle of it!

we subsequently had antibody tests (me and dp) and they came back positive. As did the salon lady. So I'm pretty sure that was it!

[feelingverylazytoday]

New infections (not deaths) in London peaked the week before lockdown, when people were asked to start socially distancing themselves, and to self isolate if they had temperature/persistent coughs, which were seen as the primary symptoms themselves.
I think it was always going to be inevitable that London would be hit hard and early, and therefore would come out of it earlier. I think you need to compare London with NYC to see if a similar pattern has emerged.

[longestlurkerever]

nihiloxica i have generally heard it in the daily update as "reducing" rather than "low".

[StrawberryRaven]

Personally I think a degree of herd immunity is the only reasonable explanation.

There is so much we don't know about the virus, it seems well beyond the realms of possibility to me that there are people who have had it (or have some kind of natural immunity that scientists don't understand) that aren't picked up by the current testing options available.

I agree with the PP earlier on who said that if lockdown was the reason for the drop we'd have seen lower-affected UK regions (at the start of lockdown) nip infection rates in the bud weeks ago.

The figures are only ever a snapshot of a certain small proportion of the population but this seems like a significant pattern even taking it into account.

Would be truly excellent news if the virus really has run out of steam in London.

[findingschools4myboys]

I am in London and I don’t know a single friend here that doesn’t think they have had it. Some tested some not.

[mynameiscalypso]

Whereas I am also in London and don't know anyone who thinks they've had it - a couple of people have had to isolate because, eg, their child had a temp but the only cases I know of are outside London.

[Iwillhavetea]

I live in a town of 45,000 and only know of one lad who went to hospital with it. Really poorly. All the symptoms. But his test was negative. So can't be sure. Then onean around the corner from me in his 60s had it and went to hospital. I've seen a local business man had died who lives in a village on the outskirts. He was rich that's why he made the paper. He was on his 70s. That's about it. So nobody on particular I know is getting it.

[BigSandyBalls2015]

I work in central London and live on outskirts, and I was off work mid/late Jan with an awful ‘virus’ and so were lots of my colleagues. Ended up going to the GP for the first time in years as I was coughing so much with a very sore chest. GP said she had never seen so many people with similar weird symptoms.

[Pinklynx]

I think it's a combination of people already having had it and good observation of social distancing. I had it after having had flu in January, got ill again in February/March and have tested positive. I've got friends who had it from a skiing holiday in late Feb and I think I gave it to my sister pre-lockdown as she had similar symptoms to me. I got it from my son who was really sick with it and got it from school.

[boobot1]

an ex Director of the WHO said their was evidence that Covid was fizzling out itself like SARS and a vaccine was probably not necessary.

[AvoidingTheWineAisle]

I also suspect a lot more people have had it in London than the stats suggest. I think we peaked around Easter or earlier.

Similar experience to other Londoners on this thread. A fever/cough illness swept through my large organisation in early March. I had a fever and terrible stomach cramps for a 2 weeks before lockdown, and my DD had a fever and cough. My sister and brother in law both had fever and cough right at the start of March. etc etc. I think maybe two thirds of the people I know had symptoms in March. We don’t know which of us had covid because nobody was hospitalised and tested, but I’ll bet many of us did.

Since then the city has been pretty much shut. Despite the Daily Mail photos of packed parks, public transport has been drastically less full, lots of people are working from home and the social side of this city - all the heaving pubs and shops and restaurants - is closed. Its not London as we knew it, so it makes sense that herd immunity + social distancing = low figures.

[BackInTime]

London peaked much earlier, people were also aware of what was happening in Europe and started working from home and avoiding crowded places and public transport long before Boris decided to lockdown. I think many of the current cases are going to be in care homes and hospitals with less and less spread in the community.

[longestlurkerever]

Also pictures of packed tubes are weird as trains go past my window (Not tube, but including local commuter trains that are normally heaving). There's never more than about 2-3 people max on them. I am not sure why trains would be empty and tubes full.

[Elmerrrrrrrr]

Surely if it was here in November the death rate would have gone up then?

[mynameiscalypso]

Social distancing is quite well enforced even in parks etc - a lot of the photos you see in the paper are at such a misleading angle. I was in a busy park yesterday which often features in the DM in lockdown madness type pictures and you could see in person that everyone was social distancing but a photo would have given a very misleading view. The parks round me also have plenty of staff around to enforce social distancing.

[frumpety]

As far as the antibody tests are concerned , someone I know has taken part in the Imperial College/ Ipsos trial and their test was negative, however it says in the paper work that a negative result might not be a true result, so a false negative. Does anybody know the accuracy rate of the particular test being used in that trial ?

I think we have tested about 4-5 % of the UK population so far ? I am not sure how many of those have been in a hospital setting ? I am also not sure if they have included people who have tested positive in hospital and then have been re-tested during admission ? So one individual may have had 3 seperate tests iyswim ? So are they counting the number of people tested or the number of tests ?

[Daffodil101]

People in my office all had it in March, too.

There is an Israeli professor who thinks it will disappear overnight. I think his views were generally thought to be incorrect but maybe he was right after all.

However, it doesn’t look as though it’s disappeared quite so dramatically elsewhere in the world.

[Daffodil101]

www.google.com/amp/s/www.euroweeklynews.com/2020/04/24/israeli-professor-says-coronavirus-covid-19-has-a-life-of-about-70-days-then-disappears/amp/

[Derbygerbil]

@boobot1

Given that globally infections are still rising, there’s no evidence of it fizzling out to the point of not needing a vaccine. Assuming that the large scale Spanish and NY antibody tests are correct (5% and 20% respectively), unfortunately there’s a huge proportion of the population for it to burn through, even if a degree of herd immunity has occurred in major population centres.